Anthony de Mello - One minute wisdom (1985)

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There were rules in the monastery, but the Master always warned against the tyranny of the law.
"Obedience keeps the rules," he would say. "Love knows when to break them."

Anthony de Mello
Much advance publicity was made for the address the Master would deliver on The Destruction of the World and a large crowd gathered at the monastery grounds to hear him.
The address was over in less than a minute. All he said was:
"These things will destroy the human race: politics without principle, progress without compassion, wealth without work, learning without silence, religion without fearlessness and worship without awareness."

Anthony de Mello
"What is love?"
"The total absence of fear," said the Master.
"What is it we fear?"
"Love," said the Master.

Anthony de Mello
Is there life before death? — that is the question!

Anthony de Mello
Whatever is truly alive must die. Look at the flowers; only plastic flowers never die.

Anthony de Mello
If you never condemned you would never need to forgive.

Anthony de Mello
The Master insisted that what he taught was nothing, what he did was nothing.
His disciples gradually discovered that Wisdom comes to those who learn nothing, unlearn everything.
That transformation is the consequence not of something done, but of something dropped.

Anthony de Mello
Wisdom tends to grow in proportion to one's awareness of one's ignorance.

Anthony de Mello
"You are only a disciple because your eyes are closed. The day you open them you will see there is nothing you can learn from me or anyone."
"What then is a Master for?"
"To make you see the uselessness of having one."

Anthony de Mello
Thought can organize the world so well that you are no longer able to see it.

Anthony de Mello
The Master was exceedingly gracious to university dons who visited him, but he would never reply to their questions or be drawn into their theological speculations. To his disciples, who marveled at this, he said, "Can one talk about the ocean to a frog in a well or about the divine to people who are restricted by their concepts?"

Anthony de Mello
A good teacher offers practice, a bad one offers theories.

Anthony de Mello
The sun and its light, the ocean and the wave, the singer and his song — not one. Not two.

Anthony de Mello
Silence is not the absence of sound, but the absence of self.

Anthony de Mello
A writer arrived at the monastery to write a book about the Master.
"People say you are a genius. Are you?" he asked.
"You might say so." said the Master, none too modestly.
"And what makes one a genius?" "The ability to recognize." "Recognize what?"
"The butterfly in a caterpillar: the eagle in an egg; the saint in a selfish human being."

Anthony de Mello
The Master never ceased to attack the notions about God that people entertain.

Anthony de Mello
All suffering comes from a person's inability to sit still and be alone.

Anthony de Mello
You have within yourself the answer to every question you propose - if you only knew how to look for it. In the Land of the spirit, you cannot walk by the light of someone else's lamp. You want to borrow mine. I'd rather teach you how to make your own.

Anthony de Mello
God in heaven holds each person by a string. When you sin, you cut the string. Then God ties it up again. Making a knot, bringing you a little closer to Him. Again and again your sins cut the string and with each knot God keeps drawing you closer and closer.

Anthony de Mello
You can read books without ever stepping into a library; and practice spirituality without ever going to a temple.

Anthony de Mello
To a woman who complained about her destiny the Master said, "It is you who make your destiny." "But surely I am not responsible for being born a woman?" "Being born a woman isn't destiny. That is fate. Destiny is how you accept your womanhood and what you make of it."

Anthony de Mello
Spirituality practiced in the state of activity is incomparably superior to that practiced in a state of withdrawel.

Anthony de Mello
People who deliberate fully before they take a step will spend their lives on one leg

Anthony de Mello
If you make me your authority, you harm yourself because you will not see things for yourself, and you harm me too because you refuse to see me as I am.

Anthony de Mello
When you are guilty, it is not your sins you hate but yourself.

Anthony de Mello
"What kind of a person does Enlightenment produce?"
Said the Master:
"To be public-spirited and belong to no party,
to move without being bound to any given course,
to take things as they come,
have no remorse for the past,
no anxiety for the future,
to move when pushed,
to come when dragged,
to be like a mighty gale,
like a feather in the wind,
like weeds floating on a river,
like a mill-stone meekly grinding,
to love all creation equally
as heaven and earth are equal to all
— such is the product of Enlightenment."
On hearing these words one of the younger disciples cried, "This sort of teaching is not for the living but for the dead," and walked away, never to return.

Anthony de Mello
The disciples were absorbed in a discussion of Lao-tzu's dictum: Those who know do not say; Those who say do not know.
When the master entered, they asked him what the words meant.
Said the master, "Which of you knows the fragrance of a rose?"
All of them indicated that they knew.
Then he said, "put it into words."
All of them were silent.

Anthony de Mello
"Why is everyone here so happy except me?"
"Because they have learned to see goodness and beauty everywhere," said the Master.
"Why don't I see goodness and beauty everywhere?"
"Because you cannot see outside of you what you fail to see inside."

Anthony de Mello
The Master is not concerned with what we believe — only with what we see.

Anthony de Mello
This is what Wisdom means: To be changed without the slightest effort on your part, to be transformed, believe it or not, merely by waking to the reality that is not words, that lies beyond the reach of words. If you are fortunate enough to be Awakened thus, you will know why the finest language is the one that is not spoken, the finest action is the one that is not done and the finest change is the one that is not willed.

Anthony de Mello